Hyundai Ioniq 5, the winner of the World Car of the Year, will witness production hiccups thanks to a problem with chips made by Infineon. As reported by KED Global, industry sources in South Korea said the chip maker condemned two months’ worth of production due to a flaw detected in the chips.
Infineon Technologies discovered a severe problem with its insulated-gate bipolar transistor (IGBT) chips. The chips affected were produced between early April and early June, a span of two months. The error was serious enough that Infineon needed to scrap all the chips.
The batches were supposed to the supplied to Hyundai, who would have started receiving them this month. However, the flaw came during injecting aluminum-ion into the chips in place of nitrogen.
The IGBT chips are used to make power electric or PE systems, for PE modules, which the IONIQ 5 uses. Making a power module takes four months, including three for producing the IGBT chip.
This delay may extend the waiting times for the IONIQ 5 to over a year.
Hyundai is scrambling to find a substitute supplier but has committed to significantly boosting its internal chip production capacity.
Infineon produces 12.7 percent of global auto chips, followed by NXP with 11.8 percent and Renesas with 8.4 percent.
Many police departments worldwide have adopted the IONIQ 5, including Austria’s Bludenz.
